Blind Faith
by Gigi the Ragdoll
Summary: "Like all magic, it too would enact a price. But what won't the heart pay to simply beat again?" AU for the coming season. Belle struggles with a curse love won't heal while Rumpelstiltskin faces the possibility of a fate worse than death. Rating to go up.
1. Prologue

Prologue

"Y-You're not coming back, are you…"

He did not answer her. He didn't have to.

The words hung between them, severing them off from everything. The docks, their current company, the pressing urgency of the departure, the pain of loss both shared and private- everything. It all fell away. For a hollow heartbeat there was nothing in the world, in _any_ world, but them, those horrific words, and the sickening sensation of freefall.

He was trapped, they both knew this; bound and strained between the threads of fate and the ties of blood. "… I must save him. I must do this to honor Baelfire. He's gone. And I didn't even get the chance to say goodbye-"

She broke. Breath choked; her heart tore and caught, like him, somewhere in that horrific in-between. Oh, to be selfish just this once. Just once to love the man for all his cowardice, and loath his righteous heart; if picking vice before virtues would but keep him in her arms.

She wanted to cry. She wanted to scream. To hide. To run. To rend her hair. To hold him. Touch him. Beg him. To grieve. To burn. To grovel, implore on hands and knees that he might stay. That he go. That she not be left alone again! To break. To laugh. To strike him. To strike all of them. To make him take it back. Gods, make him take it all back. To make him see how deeply he was hurting her, even when he did the right thing!

"I understand." She said. And she did. Truly, _truly_ she did, even if she wished she couldn't. "But I also know that the future isn't always what it seems."

Because fate could not be so cruel, so unforgiving, so _unfair_, as to deliver them unto each other once again only to rip them apart. It was a tidal dance they knew all too well, brief moments to savor bookended by eons apart. And that this should be the end- mere hours back in her own skin and she was losing him again. It was just too much.

An iron vice closed about her heart and in the next moment she was in his arms, her lips seeking his with a desperate resolve. As though her mouth could draw from him in wordless worship the venom fate had cast.

_I will see you again._

She wasn't sure she'd said it- if it had been said at all. But it was true. It had to be.

It wasn't a promise, not really. Nor was it an oath, a hope, or even a wish. It was a curse- a powerful beam of magic penned in the heart and sealed between lips and tongue and breath. Five words that cut through them both in the worst way, threading them together even as everything around them crumbled to dust. She loved him, all of him, for everything he had help make her and everything they would become. Surely such a curse could only bare love's moniker? So Belle cast her spell in the only magic she knew how to wield; the most powerful magic there was to be had.

And like all magic, it too would enact a price. But what won't the heart pay to simply beat again?


	2. Part 1

Part I

…_O, woe is me,_

_T'have seen what I have seen, see what I see!_

Absent hours bled quickly to absent days, days to weeks, and weeks began to pile one atop another till they were unrecognizable to Belle.

There had been a great deal to do once the barrier spell had been cast. Indeed, the casting itself had been no small affair. It first called for a kind of staking ritual; wooden stakes inlayed with wards had to be placed strategically through the town and all along the border lines. Ruby had been an indispensable, as had Dr. Hopper. It had taken some convincing, but soon Anton the former giant and Snow White's entire guard had joined the cause, and (to the surprise of all) the infamous town recluse Jefferson as well. The Hatter's detailed maps had proven invaluable as had the dwarf's familiarity with the towns mining tunnels. In a matter of hours the work was done.

Next had come the ritual itself; an all together convoluted matter filled with odd props and strange words and meticulous postures and pageantry. It was the kind of thing she could imagine Rumple, at least the Rumple of the Enchanted Forest, taking great pride and pleasure in executing. The whole affair seemed as much decadent performance as it was practical methodology.

Belle did not allow herself a chance to think on it, to contemplate what she was doing. The spell had to be cast. The town needed to be protected. It was the right thing to do. It had to be done. It had to. And if she stopped to think about it, if she considered, even for a moment, the insurmountable barrier she was putting in place…

When it was done and the last utterance sounded, there had come a sudden pulse, a soundless hum that had resonated through bone and brick, raising the hair on the back of her neck as the web of wards came to life. The world seemed to vibrate, her ears popped.

And then- silence.

Standing in the center of the town, the clock tower at her back, Belle held her breath. There was not a sound, not even a breath of wind. The still had been so eerily complete, so palpable, she was seized by a sudden and irrational fear that everything and everyone truly had just up and disappeared beneath that pulse of magic. She felt for a brief instant she was truly and completely alone in an empty town, an empty world. The loneliness of the thought, ridiculous as it may have been, overwhelmed her.

Seconds passed and nothing happened. Not a cricket chirped, nor a branch rustle. There was nothing but the empty streets and endless silence. Belle fought for breath, desperate to steady her racing fears.

"Well-" came a voice at her elbow, "That was rather anticlimactic."

Belle nearly jumped out of her skin. She spun sharply to find the Hatter all but looming over her and doing a piss poor job at hiding that smug grin of his. Catching a shaky breath the maiden huffed before turning back to the empty street. Undeterred, Jefferson sidled up beside her again, crossing his arms in a dramatic flourish.

"You reckon it worked?" Jefferson voiced the question that was currently making knots out of her stomach.

"We can only hope so." She said instead.

"Can we?"

She glanced up at the eccentric man, eyeing the tension about his shoulders that seemed at odds with the manic glitter about his eye. Belle did not know the Hatter well, though she owed him a debt she felt she could never properly repay. After all, he had been the one to risk the queen's wrath, plucking her from that horrific existence deep in her basement prison and sending her straight into the arms of the man she loved. It didn't matter what his motives had been, she was in his debt.

He was a loner, she knew that much, and he seemed to have few acquaintances in the town. Rumple had once told her the man had been a portal jumper, a reckless risk taker and explorer. She imagined that made her and the Hatter kindred spirits in a strange kind of way, two souls that yearned more for adventure and the unknown then they did the safety of the knowable and every day.

But for all that, Belle also knew he was a father. His little Grace frequented the library often and rarely left with less than five books wrapped in her eager little arms. It had been the few times she had ever seen him, standing outside the library's glass doors as he waited for his girl to make her selection so they could be on their way. He never came inside. As soon as Grace stepped foot out of the building he was on her, scooping her into his arms and holding her as though she might fall to pieces otherwise. Belle did not need to be a parent to recognize the needy love and fear that underlined his desperate and gentle gesture. She had seen it all before. A father's love was sacred, and all the reckless inclinations in the world could never negate that kind of bond.

Belle could see it now, so clearly laced in the tension of his shoulders and the lock of his knees. It undermined his flamboyant airs and despite everything, she felt what little she had left of her heart go out to the man beside her. Gently she reached out to him, placing a soft hand on his forearm and waited for him to look at her properly.

"She will be safe." Belle said. "I promise. We will all be safe, having the barrier in place- it well all be alright."

The man stared, clearly caught off guard. It occurred to her that Jefferson, loaner that he was, probably was not used to such kind or strong words offered so openly and freely. She smiled sadly at the thought, giving his arm a little squeeze. That was ok; Belle was use to believing in that which most did not have eyes enough to see. She could be strong for both of them.

The Hatter recovered, snorting as he pulled away from her. Belle could not help but note how he avoided her eyes. "Faith is a beautiful thing." He dismissed with a wave of his hand. Belle shrugged, but did not give an inch.

"Sometimes faith is all we have."

The words rang true, but she was surprised by the way they set the barbs about her heart contracting painfully. She refused to dwell on it.

"Faith is beautiful," He said again "but not when it is blinding. I may be mad my dear, but I'm no fool. Fate trumps faith, whether we will it or no."

Belle felt her jaw tense, her heart tighten that little more.

"We will see."

The barrier was cast. They would be safe for now, protected from prying eyes and wicked intentions. The town would disappear to the outside world, and no force, no interloper, no traveler, no matter how determined, would ever find it again.

Belle had never hated the fates more in all her life.


End file.
